February 2009

We settled into Darwin in a hurry, and went straight to work. The wet was still around, and the humidity was very high every day. The air conditioner got a fair work out. There were only a few others in the park, all workers, and so it was a nice atmosphere.

Since we knew we would be staying here for a while to build up our finances, we set up early for a long stay.

One thing we got was a Wii video game console with the balance board so we could use it to get fit. It was small enough to easily fit in the van and we could use it inside in the air conditioning.

We found a very cheap glasshouse (plastic covered) in Bunnings and turned it into a shade house so we could have a few plants to make things more homely.

April 2009

Now that the roads had opened after the wet, we went to see the country around Darwin.

This is a back road down to< Litchfield park with the long grass right to the road edge. It was like this for mile after mile./P>

Waiget beach at the end of Cox Peninsular Road. As the crow flies it is just a few miles across the water from the city, but by car it is a 150km drive.

It's a quiet and remote area, but still the land prices are horrendous. A sandy scrub block will cost over $200,000. Sandflies at no extra cost!

May 2009

With Litchfield Park now open we went to see the falls while there was still a good water flow from the wet.

They were much better than when we had seen them last year. This is Wangui Falls, and even from the viewing platform you could feel the spray.

Since Lyn's legs were very much better, we went for a walk up the boardwalk trail around the falls.

We had bought our old market stock with us, and so Lyn started doing the Coolalinga Saturday market.

This was an early stall. We added covers and more stock as time went on.

Another trip was to Pine Creek and a visit to Pussy Cat Flats without the rain.

Unfortunately nothing was on that day.

May 2009

Early morning and off to work before the sun is up. Just giving Zebbie a little nurse.

August 2009

We've been here six months, and only now decided to put up our annex.

Heaps of tourists walking around, and the extra bit of privacy was welcome.

Also bought a smaller folding table as we had sold our other large ones with the rest of our market things.

The carpet came from a building renovation I found in the city while delivering there one morning.

The shadehouse has been growing. In fact it is nearly time we had a bigger one.

11 October 2009

We set off today for Jabiru as Lyn wanted to see if the store there had another crocodile "welcome" sign that she had set here heart on having.

Luckily for us, they had one, so we then went on a bit further and had a look at the Ranger Uranium mine.

This is one of the dams there for the mine.

25 October 2009

We've decided that we will leave Darwin on Christmas Eve. The work pay week finishes on the Wednesday, so that puts us on the road some time on the Thursday. If the weather gets really bad, we could leave earlier. Time will tell.

Zebbie the cat is just worn out every day. It's a hard life!

19 November 2009

We've been carrying a cute, pink galah that we bought in Kimba last December. Finally, after much 'discussion' about doing something with it, we found a large dish and some tinsel, together with a dozen xmas balls, and turned it into a pink-parrot-nest with eggs.

A couple of small trees in pink pots completed the table scene.

9th December 2009

A combination of things has bought forward our decision to leave, and so now tomorrow is the day.

Mick, the manager of the park invited us to a little get-together and nibblies before we left.

True to form, it rained that evening, but not too bad.

Packing was a major operation as we had not moved for a fair while, but we managed to get everything on board eventually, so now it's farewell to Darwin once again.

We leave Darwin heading South - click here to follow.

Return to previous page - click here for our trip to Darwin.